


Time Out

by MissJeeves



Series: Timely [7]
Category: Justified
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Prostitution, Anal Sex, Bad Boyd, Blackmail, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Intimidation, M/M, Minor Character Death, Sex Tapes, Sex for Favors, Sexual Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-02
Updated: 2014-07-02
Packaged: 2018-02-07 02:59:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1882584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissJeeves/pseuds/MissJeeves
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raylan gets help from an unlikely source.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time Out

No help comes from Lexington.

In fact, nothing happens.

Federal agents don’t even show up to rattle Boyd Crowder’s cage, and they do that on a fairly regularly basis even when he hasn’t assaulted a federal officer.

Raylan knows that means Tim didn’t tell them who hurt him. Of course he didn’t.

The silence that follows, Raylan didn’t fully expect. He thinks Tim will call or something, hell, even show up at Audrey’s.

He’s been released from the hospital. Raylan knows this because Boyd had thugs watching him. Fellow U.S. Marshals packed up his place and moved all his stuff out, too. Tim stays out of sight and out of touch for months after the attack.

This probably ratchets things down for Raylan. He knows Boyd can’t hurt Tim again, if he’s in hiding. And Boyd sort of loses interest in punishing Raylan for that relationship, because Tim’s vanished.

Boyd has a busy drug empire to manage, and abusing Raylan for personal reasons isn’t nearly as profitable as devoting most of his time to narcotic distribution.

Instead of weekly attention, it dwindles down to monthly. And Ava is no longer involved, either because she doesn’t want to play with him anymore or Boyd wants to monopolize their time together.

Raylan will take it. Anything that keeps Boyd occupied and calm reduces the likelihood of him doing something terrible to someone.

And Boyd is calm. In fact, with Tim’s absence, he’s taken to acting as if he never attacked Tim or fucked Raylan with a gun. As long as Raylan is obedient, it’s like everything has been forgiven.

Aside from that awful night with gun, those few times with Ava in the mix, and a select number of incidents in the past where Raylan really pissed him off somehow, Boyd can be a different person in bed. A gentle, affectionate, incredibly manipulative person. Trusting that person, Raylan thinks, is how he ended up a prisoner in this place and how Tim ended up in a hospital.

Raylan doesn’t think about Tim while he’s sucking Boyd off. He really doesn’t. His mind is blank except for following the game plan that means he swallows Boyd’s orgasm and doesn’t have to fuck him.

Boyd’s hips snap once, then twice, his hands tightening around Raylan’s head as he drives down Raylan’s throat.

“You are too good at that,” Boyd says, breathily, as he pulls out of Raylan’s mouth.

Raylan is exceptionally motivated to be good at that, but in the spirit of keeping the peace established in the last couple months, he doesn’t say that. He just shrugs and licks Boyd’s orgasm off his lips in a way that might be sultry.

Boyd beckons for him to get off his knees and join him at the head of the bed. Raylan obeys, letting Boyd draw him upwards. There’s a string of semen on his chin, so Boyd scrapes it off and feeds it to Raylan. He licks it, but Boyd keeps his fingers in his mouth, almost like he expects Raylan to fellate those, too. He acts enthusiastic about it, which is the best way for Boyd to lose interest in something.

“C’mere,” Boyd orders, manhandling Raylan until his chest is pressed against Raylan’s back, his flaccid cock idling against his ass. Sometimes Boyd can be frustratingly resilient in that department. For the moment, though, his cock is thick, but soft.

Boyd digs his chin into Raylan’s shoulder, one arm draped over his chest and the other resting on the curve of his hip. Raylan would seriously rather just have sex than cuddle, so he opens his legs a little, inviting Boyd to go for his hole.

But, Boyd doesn’t fall for it.

“You haven’t heard from your boy,” Boyd says, softly into his ear.

With their bodies pressed together like this, Raylan has to work hard to keep himself from having a physical reaction that Boyd will feel.

“You’d know if I had,” he mutters back, concentrating on breathing and keeping tension out of his body. Jimmy is still stuck to Raylan and his car is still gone.

Boyd drums his fingers against Raylan’s thigh, then slides them backwards towards his ass. Raylan feels dry pressure against his hole for a second, then Boyd withdraws. He’s offered Boyd’s hand and he obediently slicks it up with his tongue, which won’t help much.

“That’s unfortunate,” Boyd says, pressing one spit-wet fingertip into Raylan.

“Thought that’s what you wanted,” Raylan says, plainly.

Boyd chuckles like that’s funny, at the same time jamming his finger entirely into Raylan.

“He’s alive, you know,” Boyd says. “Out of the hospital and everything.”

Raylan nods, keeping his breathing steady.

“And not a word,” Boyd continues.

“Maybe he thinks you’ll try to kill him again,” Raylan offers.

Raylan feels the teeth of Boyd’s grin against his neck. “Oh, I hope he didn’t think that was me trying,” he says. “That was just…an invoice.”

A second finger, dry and dragging, joins the first inside Raylan. They move in unison, sharply, and Raylan can’t control his flinch.

“Sulking is not a good look on you,” Boyd says into his ear. “You let a fox into my hen house, the hell were you expecting?”

“I thought that was my job,” he protests, softly.

“You made this one into a pet,” Boyd says, mixing his metaphors. “I like them tagged and feral.”

“He wasn’t a threat,” Raylan says, though he shouldn’t be arguing. “He really wasn’t.”

Boyd’s fingering turns into thrusting.

“I love many things about you, Raylan,” Boyd says, and Raylan hates him. “But your impressive naivety is not among them.”

Raylan presses back against Boyd’s hand, hoping to end this conversation. He can feel Boyd’s erection growing against him.

“I don’t have a US Marshal,” Boyd says, punctuating a particularly wicked thrust. Raylan gasps, mostly theatrically, and reaches for Boyd’s cock.

They roll once, maybe twice, and then Raylan is on his hands and knees with Boyd glued to his back.

“I don’t either,” Raylan says. “You took care of that.”

Boyd draws back to spit at his asshole, adds a third barely wet finger.

“He’ll be back,” he says, confidently. “Show me you’re worth it, Raylan.”

Raylan thrusts back against his hand, miserable.

Boyd spits some more, then his fingers are gone and Raylan is open and empty for only a second before Boyd’s hot, blunt cock shoves into him almost dry.

“Yeah,” Boyd says, rutting into him. “He’ll be back.”

~

In surveillance photos courtesy of the FBI and DEA, Harlan – and Raylan – looks unchanged. Heroin, marijuana, and sex sales continue unabated. Boyd was certainly never afraid of reprisal or consequence for going after Tim, because he’s continued all of his criminal enterprises as overtly as usual.

Rachel agrees to let Tim in on operations to that extent. She hasn’t told him of any schedule, but seems to think that showing him the pictures will convince him of Raylan’s safety.

And the Raylan in the photos is unhurt. Tim thinks he looks a little sadder than usual, but that could be his imagination.

The photos are all he has. Between physical therapy and visiting the range every day trying to get his body to where he’ll be able to shoot Boyd Crowder in the face from any distance given the chance, he’s not back to work yet. This is okay, because if he was, he’d have to deal with how much Rachel doesn’t trust him.

He still has a rotation of body guards, but there won’t be the budget for that much longer. Since his unidentified attackers didn’t threaten him or send a bomb threat or anything like that, protective custody has to end sometime.

Rachel has started talking about Witsec, if he spills on Crowder. And all of a sudden, Tim is considering it. If it’s open to Raylan, too. Never again having to think about Crowder, or being thrown over his own couch with his pants down, is hugely appealing.

But that’s only a possibility. And frankly, he too easily can imagine Raylan refusing to cooperate. That’s what Rachel thinks, anyway. And she buzzes it in his ear every chance she gets.

So he’s apartment-hunting for a place with some better security, in the meantime. It’s going to be more expensive, but he wants a building where Crowder gets his photo taken fourteen times before he gets anywhere near Tim. In this scenario, he also shoots Crowder and his sidekicks full of holes the moment he sees them, but the cameras are a bonus.

Tim picks up Loretta to show her the new digs, even though it’s not Sunday. Partially to demonstrate how the increased cost precludes two bedrooms, since he’s pretty sure he likes her much more now than he would if he had any official responsibility for her. Also to prove to her that he’s going to be fine and no one’s going to hurt him again. She tried not to show it, but underneath her teenage indifference and sarcasm, he knows his attack rattled her. Her father was murdered, so he can see the fact that someone tried to kill him, too, could be unpleasant déjà vu even if he declines to claim any kind of paternal role.

Loretta doesn’t actually spend much time whining about her foster family and implying he could rescue her from them, which is a nice development.

The body guard, a LPD uni, stays outside the door.

“Is Rachel here?” Loretta asks, glancing around his new living room without comment. He got a new couch. This one is blue and it’s up against the wall, which makes Tim happy but Shredder sad because she can only claw three sides of it.

“No,” Tim says. “She’s my partner, not my wife.” He pauses. “Why?”

Loretta takes a seat on his couch, pulling her book bag into her lap and unzipping it.

“I saw someone from Harlan after school today,” she says, hands dipping inside her bag.

“Yeah,” Tim says, warily. He doesn’t know where this is going, unless it’s about Raylan.

He waits and she makes hesitant eye contact.

“I was selling,” she admits.

“Of course you were,” he says. “Who was it?”

“Johnny Crowder,” she says and he goes stiff. “He gave me this to give to you,” Loretta continues. She pulls something beige and crumpled from her bag and hands it over.

It takes a second to reform, but then it looks like a hat again. Raylan’s hat. The last time Tim saw it, it was in Boyd Crowder’s hands.

That’s probably where the ugly red-brown blood smear in the shape of handprint came from.

While Tim is staring at the hat, Loretta is getting upset.

“That’s Raylan’s,” she says, urgently. “And that’s blood.”

She’s practically vibrating on the couch, so he quickly sits down next to her and puts an arm across her shoulders.

“They did something –” she begins.

“No,” he interrupts. “They didn’t.”

“But-”

“That’s my blood,” he says, and it feels weird to talk about it out loud. “It was in my apartment that night and they took it when they left.”

Loretta goes quiet and still, processing that. He doesn’t think it makes her feel much better, understandably.

“Oh,” she says. “Raylan’s okay?”

He doesn’t know that, so he doesn’t say it. “It’s my blood.”

“I thought you didn’t know who attacked you,” she says, suddenly shrugging his arm off her body.

He doesn’t answer.

“You lied to the police.” She sounds shocked, but maybe a little impressed.

“For good reasons,” he says. “Not recreational marijuana reasons.”

“Hypocrite,” she says, but without any heat. She gestures at the bloody hat. “What does that mean, then?”

Tim shrugs. “Probably a forget-me-not.” He’s more concerned about the delivery method. “Johnny Crowder say anything?”

“To give that to you and then he bought an ounce.” She stares at him. “I’m being honest.”

“Good for you,” he congratulates her. “No threats, didn’t steal your lunch money…”

Loretta shakes her head. She points at the hat again. “I think that’s probably a threat.”

“They probably know where I live now,” Tim agrees.

She blinks at him, then it dawns on her. “They followed me?”

“But if they knew to do that, they probably knew where I was at the safehouse,” he says. “But I might need to break my lease.”

He doesn’t think the threat is against _him._ But Loretta is starting to look upset again, so he goes with it.

“I’ll call Rachel, they’ll move me again,” he says, calmly.

“Why did they do it?” she asks, leaning into his side.

He shrugs. “I think they thought it was fun.” She looks at him funny. “Seriously.”

“Because you were dating Raylan?”

“That probably helped.” He pauses, hating this part. “Loretta, I need you not to say anything about this to anyone.”

Without missing a beat, she agrees. “Okay.”

“But lying is bad,” he adds, and she arches an eyebrow.

He has a patrol car pick up Loretta and take her home, but not before warning her to call the police and run if anyone else from Harlan approaches her. He is going to tell Rachel about the Crowders visiting her, because he does not like that at all. Loretta might need a safehouse, too. Tim checks to make sure the LPD officer is still outside his door; he is. He puts his gun holster on, anyway. At the range his shots are all still wide close up but he’s much better at a distance. He packs a duffle bag and prepares to capture Shredder in her carrier, before he calls Rachel. Tim doesn’t fully understand the bloody hat message, and it might not be more complex than notifying Tim they can still find him.

The new place is nice, but he’s not staying here a second longer.

~

The safehouse is another long-term hotel, but a different one this time.

Rachel is going a little overboard with the positive reinforcement for telling her about the day’s events. She’s effusively proud that he called in the hat, like she thinks he has no sense of self-preservation. Maybe she has a point, but he’s not that dumb.

She also goes to put the hat in an evidence bag.

“That’s probably Crowder’s hand,” she points out, when he rolls his eyes. “And your blood.”

“Won’t get prints off that,” he retorts. “And every Crowder and his cousin probably touched it.”

“Good,” she says. “I’ll arrest all of them.”

But as she’s trying to get it inside the bag, her hand slips under the brim.

“Tim,” Rachel says. “There’s something in it.”

She digs for a second, then holds up a silver thumb drive that appears between her fingers. “It was sewn inside,” she says.

“I didn’t notice it,” he says, honestly. Maybe the hat wasn’t the only message.

“What’s on it?” she asks.

He can only shake his head. Tim doesn’t know. He can take a guess, but none of the options are good.

For a moment, Rachel is his partner again. Even though she’s been angry with him for months and doesn’t want to trust him anymore.

She lets him view the thumb drive files on his laptop, alone in the bedroom.

Maybe because she has a guess as to what’s on there, too.

And they’re both right, at least in part.

One of the files is a five-minute hidden camera video of Raylan and Tim having sex. It’s really old. Not their first time, but not their last. The angle suggests Boyd has a camera in the trailer ceiling Raylan doesn’t know about. It makes Tim wonder when Boyd found out.

The video itself isn’t upsetting. Tim’s come to terms with the fact that something like this existed. The images are clear and unquestionable. But, it’s just Raylan, and if it’s career suicide, it’s not as bad as getting beaten and stabbed.

The other files are not what Tim expected and they _are_ upsetting.

More videos. Most are of terrible things being done to Raylan. Someone edited the footage to conceal the guy’s identity, but Tim knows it has to be Boyd. Boyd’s faceless body smacks Raylan around in bed, before sodomizing him. It’s rough sex verging into violence, because even though the video is mute, Tim can hear Raylan crying out. Boyd is clearly trying to hurt him. All the same, Raylan never tries to get away, or hit back. He shoves futilely against Boyd’s chest at one point, but that’s his only resistance.

The files get worse. Boyd sodomizes Raylan with a handgun, then makes him fellate it.

Tim has to stop that one, because he’s going to throw up.

The other videos are from different nights. It’s more of the same, Raylan being taken roughly, by Boyd and by the disembodied hands of a woman holding frighteningly large sex toys. The gun doesn’t make another appearance, thankfully.

The last two files are different, but not better.

One is just a long-distance shot of Tim shortly after he left the safehouse for the first time. That wouldn’t be too alarming except the camera zooms out and catches Loretta walking next to him. It cuts him out of the frame completely, following her and lingering on her face. The next image shows her walking alone into her foster home.

“Shit,” Tim says, aloud.

The final file is along the same lines. Except instead of following Loretta, the camera is stalking Rachel as she walks through the US Marshal’s building parking lot.

Tim wants to delete the first video before he shows everything to Rachel. But he doesn’t. His embarrassment is secondary or maybe thirdly or fourthly, and he’s trying to win back her trust.

“Come in,” he calls, and Rachel immediately opens his bedroom door and steps inside.

Tim hits play on the video of Loretta. “You need to call Loretta’s foster parents and have her taken into custody,” he says. “I shouldn’t have let her go home.”

Rachel is already reaching for her phone. “There’s one of you, too,” he adds.

“Good.” Rachel scowls, “Let them try.”

She calls LPD and sends them to Loretta’s house while he calls Alison and warns her. In their short conversation, he agrees to sign the foster parent paperwork for her, since it’s pretty unlikely there’s another licensed foster care provider who also happens to be in protective custody. And this is his fault, anyway.

“What else is on here?” Rachel asks, leaning over him and looking at the screen.

“Mostly Raylan getting sexually assaulted by Crowder,” he tells her, bluntly. “But the first one is me and him from a hidden camera.”

He stands up and makes to leave the room.

“You can watch them,” he gives her permission. “I don’t need to see any more.”

Rachel stays in the bedroom for only a few minutes. Tim sits on the couch in the rest of the suite. It’s white and centered in the room, so maybe later he’ll shove it against a wall. In the meantime, he sits there petting Shredder, who’s perched on the back of the couch. He tries not to think about what he just saw. He tries not to think about Raylan. Of course, he thinks about both.

He’s scrubbing at his face a little when Rachel comes out of the room and sits next to him. Tim turns towards her. She’s frowning and looking all kinds of pissed off, but not at him anymore.

“Hey,” she says, and the next he knows she’s pulled him into a tight hug. He presses his eyes, burning hot with tears, against her shoulder.

“You believe me now?” he says, muffled into her clothes.

He feels her head nod against him, and it’s just enough to help him start pulling himself together. Bawling into his partner’s shirt isn’t going to solve anything. But he can hold on a little longer, because the hug feels good and he’s not sure what else he can do right now that will solve anything.

Both their cell phones start ringing simultaneously, pulling them apart.

“Where’s Loretta?” Alison says, skipping a greeting.

Rachel moves the phone away from her mouth. “LPD can’t find Loretta,” she says.

“LPD Patrol dropped her off at her foster home two hours ago,” Tim tells both of them, a pit forming in his stomach.

“She’s not there,” Rachel says, and Alison echoes her.

“Shit,” he says, putting one hand to his forehead while Alison starts asking questions he can’t answer and Rachel tells LPD to put out an Amber Alert on Loretta.

~

Loretta is gone. Her foster parents never saw her after LPD took her home. The officer watched her go inside, but that was the last time anyone had eyes on her. Her cell phone is off.

Tim wants to go into Harlan and shoot everybody.

Instead, he’s trapped in the safehose while Rachel coordinates things on her cell phone. He finally rearranges the furniture so at least that doesn’t suck. Rachel watches him, without comment.

“What does he want from you?” Rachel asks, after he shoves the couch against the wall and drops to a seat. “If that’s blackmail material, he wants you to do something for him.”

“Warn him about the DEA,” Tim says, thinking aloud. “Fuck up the raid. Destroy evidence. Let some shitkicker out of the cuffs…” He trails off. “Those are all things that he pretty much constantly needs?”

Rachel looks thoughtful and nods.

“I’m confused why he would take Loretta,” she says, finally. “He already has Raylan…and…”

“I’m not going to let him kill a teenage girl,” Tim answers. “Maybe he thought I wasn’t properly motivated?”

“I’d say you were,” she says. “Is it possible he has a marijuana-related conflict with her?”

“What?” Tim says. “No.” He pauses. “Probably not.” He stops again. “Maybe.” He puts his head in his hands.

“It was just a thought,” Rachel says.

“Don’t tell me anything about the DEA,” Tim says, after some silence. “I can’t be trusted.”

“I trust you,” Rachel says. “I think you should be on the perimeter with a rifle because you’ll know precisely who to shoot.”

~

A government-issue sedan pulls in to the parking lot outside Audrey’s. With a finger-snap from Boyd, Jimmy hustles Raylan into a storage closet. The other hookers disperse back to their trailers, but Raylan gets the special treatment.

This seems unnecessary and if the driver has company and a warrant, even more so.

There is no warrant. The visit is short, and Raylan only gets to read the ingredients on six cleaning products while praising Jimmy for resisting the urge to huff them.

The closet door opens after a while and Raylan steps out. Everyone is still there, meaning no one got arrested.

Raylan walks back to the bar to retrieve the beer he was so rudely separated from.

A wanted poster and a business card sit on the bar top. Raylan picks both up, then realizes it’s a missing person’s flyer, not a wanted poster.

He freezes when he sees the picture and reads the name: Loretta McCready.

Boyd walks over and plucks the business card out of his hand, like Raylan was going to call it or something. He’s already seen the name; it belongs to Tim’s friend Alison.

“The girl child you liberated from the Bennetts,” Boyd says, “has liberated herself from state custody.” And then he grins.

Raylan glares at him. “Did you do this?” he asks.

Boyd rolls his eyes. “I haven’t given thought to her since I acquired the Bennetts’ weed business. And I don’t foresee doing so unless she horns in on my territory.”

Boyd’s smirk makes it hard to believe him. But at the same time, Raylan can’t figure out what he’d get out of threatening Loretta.

“I’d forgotten about that little incident,” Boyd continues, as he crumples up the poster. “And that you never expressed penitence or received reprimand.”

Raylan shrinks back, stepping slightly out of striking distance. “It worked out,” he says. “You got the Bennetts' business, didn’t you?”

“Again, that doesn’t sound like penitence.” Boyd squints at him. “Maybe I should rectify that.”

Boyd wants cowering and apologies, but Raylan just picks up his beer and heads back to his trailer. Boyd’s going to do whatever he wants, with or without Raylan trying to earn forgiveness, and they both know it. He can threaten and abuse Raylan all he wants. He’s used to that. As long as it’s not Tim and Loretta really bolted on her own, Raylan doesn’t care.

~

A day or so later, Raylan regrets not taking the opportunity to offer to suck Boyd off or at least act a little sorry. He expected to get worked over, maybe, or something else unpleasant but not particularly unusual.

Except Boyd comes up with something new and ridiculous. Maybe it’s not his idea, but he goes gleefully along with it.

Dewey Crowe is a dumbass tweaker who frequents Audrey’s whenever he gets enough money from smash-n-grabbing gas stations to buy a threesome with the cheapest, grossest girls. Boyd knows him from prison and they share a few tattoos, but Dewey’s too stupid to even be a hired gun. Which means he’s really, really stupid.

Raylan sees Dewey’s clunker pull up outside and its skinny, greasy driver hops out, hauling a giant green duffle with him. The girls he likes don’t have high personal hygiene standards, but even Raylan preemptively winces at whatever is in that bag and how filthy it has to be.

That’s the only attention Raylan pays to him. Otherwise, he’s alone in his trailer sending unanswered text messages to Loretta. He’s progressed from asking where the fuck she is, to, more politely, asking her to come to Harlan so he can buy some weed. She’s probably too smart to fall for that, but it’s worth a try. He doesn’t know why she’d run off, but he doesn’t like it.

Then Jimmy bangs on his trailer door, a split second before hauling it open.

“What?” Raylan says.

“Boyd wants you to come out here,” Jimmy orders.

Raylan sighs, puts his phone down on the bedspread and rises. He follows Jimmy back into the bar, where he finds Boyd, Ava, and a semi-circle of thugs watching Dewey Crowe and his giant bag.

“Raylan-” Boyd begins.

“And a girl!” Dewey interrupts. “Raylan and a girl, I said!”

Boyd smiles tightly. He looks…amused. That emotion directed at Raylan is usually something Boyd thinks is funny and Raylan thinks is sadistic or insane.

“Dewey here would like to buy you,” Ava says.

“And a girl,” Dewey adds.

“Ain’t no girls for sale,” she tells him, smiling in the same way Boyd is.

“Maybe when you come back later,” Boyd says. “But Raylan’s good to go.”

Raylan is deeply, deeply suspicious of this. Dewey looks more cracked out than usual, hugging the enormous duffle bag to his skinny little chest, and whirling in the direction of every speaker.

“You ain’t gay,” Raylan says, looking sideways at Boyd. Dewey is gross and Raylan doesn’t want to touch him.

“Maybe I is,” Dewey retorts. “I can gay if I want.” He stops. “But I want a girl, too, like I said!”

“Don’t be a bigot, Raylan,” Ava says, sweetly. “Honey, for four figures, you can be whatever you want.”

“Four figures?” Raylan echoes. “The fuck did you do, rob a bank?” He answers his own question. “You aren’t covered in ink and the FBI, so I’m gonna go with no.” He looks pointedly at Ava and the dollar signs in her eyes. “He doesn’t have the money.”

“I do, too!”

Dewey tosses the duffle down on a table, unzipping it with one frantic motion. Ever attracted to cash, both Ava and Boyd walk closer. Dewey grabs thick stacks of bills from inside, throwing them on the table top.

“Well, shit,” Raylan says.

Boyd, all business, picks up a stack and flips through it. He counts the bundles strewn across the table.

“This is ten thousand,” he says. “Not five.”

Dewey makes a face. “Shit, I forgot to take my half out. I’m only spending five.”

But Boyd sweeps the cash closer to himself. “We hadn’t negotiated, yet,” he says. “Raylan’s price is actually fifteen, but I’ll be generous and sell him for this ten, and throw in a girl of your choosing at a later date.”

Raylan’s price has never been fifteen thousand. If he’d ever had his hands on that much money, Harlan and Boyd would have been a speck in the distance, in Raylan’s rear view mirror.

“But-” Dewey stutters.

“It’s a good deal,” Ava says. “Take it.”

Raylan also can’t figure out why Dewey is throwing that kind of money at Harlan hookers and not…whatever the fuck else Dewey likes.

“Fine,” he says. “No refunds.” He gestures with his head back towards the trailer. “And none of that gay panic shit, either.”

Boyd suppresses a laugh. “No, Raylan, you see. Mr. Crowe would like to buy you permanently. As a sex slave.” He is eminently amused by this.

“And a normal slave, too,” Dewey says. “You can clean the shitter. I mostly want the girl, for the sex.”

Raylan looks at Boyd, incredulous. Before Tim, he thinks Boyd wouldn’t even be humoring this. Part of their deal, long ago, was Raylan didn’t have to fuck everyone and Boyd would stand up for him sometimes.

“No girls today,” Ava reminds Dewey.

“There was a war about this,” Raylan says. “Your kind lost.”

“Shh,” Boyd says. “Don’t ruin this.”

“He’s all yours,” Ava says.

Dewey reaches once more into his bag. Something clanks, and the next thing he pulls out is shackles.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Raylan says, taking a step back.

Boyd shakes his head, sharply, and Jimmy shoves Raylan forward again.

“Just until you get, like, Finland,” Dewey says. “I ain’t stupid.”

“You are so stupid I’m afraid it might be sexually transmitted,” Raylan says.

“Did you get those at the jail, like a complimentary gift for all your stays?” Ava asks, in between hysterics.

Dewey is completely unaware he’s being mocked. And Raylan might find it hilarious, too, if he weren’t being held by Jimmy while Boyd helpfully attaches the shackles, waist-belt and all.

“I don’t know why I never thought of these,” he says, locking Raylan’s hands into the cuffs hanging off the chain.

“Boyd,” Raylan says. “I get it. Enough. I’m sorry.”

He tries to stroke the front of Boyd’s pants, but the cuffs don’t have enough slack in them and he misses.

“Penitence, Raylan,” Boyd says. “I knew you needed some. Enjoy your new home.” He leans in, kisses him on the cheek. “I’ll retrieve you in no time, just behave and think of Harlan,” he whispers in Raylan’s ear.

“No,” Raylan says, because he’s not going to behave. He’s going to strangle Dewey with the cuffs the moment he gets the chance and he’s not going to be sorry about it.

Jimmy buckles Raylan in the backseat of Dewey’s car, meaning the seat belt will prevent him from lurching forward and doing the strangling while he’s driving.

“When can I come for the girl?” Dewey asks.

“We’ll bring her to you,” Ava promises.

Dewey stands there a second longer, before finally getting in the car.

“I wanted a girl,” he says, hotly. He looks at Raylan in the rear view mirror. “I don’t want to gay with you.”

“I don’t want to gay with you, either,” Raylan tells him, as the car speeds off.

~

Unfortunately, Dewey is very accustomed to being lead around in shackles. That means he knows how to grab Raylan in such a way that it’s impossible for Raylan to get loose. And it might be wise to wait until the shackles are off, anyway, so he cooperates for now. Dewey leads him into the hovel that passes for the Crowe home.

The place is falling apart, but the iron head board Dewey reattaches one of his cuffs to is quite solid. Raylan makes a grab for him the moment his hand is loose, but Dewey is too fast and too skinny to get a hold of.

“I’m going to get my money back,” Dewey says, from across the room. He points at Raylan angrily. “Don’t go nowhere!”

Raylan sprawls on the bed, after testing the frame strength a couple times. He only hurts his wrist. Dewey has left the room and he can hear a manic phone conversation going on next door.

“I want ten thousand more,” Dewey yells. “They took it all. I dunno. That’s your problem.”

Boyd will be back for him. Probably in the next day, once the hilarity wears off and he realizes that Raylan is out of sight and just might be able to outwit Dewey long enough to escape and make a real run for it. Which is what Raylan resolves to do. He can ask to use the bathroom. Hell, he can offer to let Dewey explore his sexuality, as repulsive as that sounds. He’ll get loose, take Dewey’s car, and leave.

He’ll find Tim. Somehow. He’ll find him.

~

The DEA moves up the raid on Harlan. Rachel apprises them of the threat to a missing minor who might be in the Crowders’ hands. Then Tim finds out Alison took it upon herself to march in there with Loretta’s missing person flyer. That was not a good idea. They were working under the assumption that Harlan thought Tim hadn’t told anyone about Crowder’s ominous video tape of Loretta. If the Crowders have her – for whatever reason – they now know they’re suspects.

The raid gets moved up again.

Tim takes the perimeter with SWAT. He’s allowed to do this because he passed the firearm recertification standards, and because no one but Rachel knows he has a very personal reason to execute every single Crowder employee his sees through his sight.

And Rachel trusts him not to do just that. Or she’s okay with it.

But he doesn’t.

Someone else blows Devil’s brains out, when he points a gun at DEA agents swarming into Audrey’s.

Tim takes a center mass shot at Johnny Crowder, for doing the same with a shotgun. The man lives, though Tim later finds out he’s paralyzed.

Boyd Crowder is not there. Neither are Raylan or Loretta.

Elsewhere in Harlan, other units arrest Bo Crowder. They do not find Boyd. Ava Crowder is missing, too. And no one finds Loretta.

Audrey’s is total chaos. There are gun thugs, prostitutes, DEA and ATF agents, and now EMTs and coroners.

It’s possible Raylan or Loretta are here, hidden somewhere. The place is a mass of secret doors and storage rooms, typically used to hide drugs and guns. Tim resolves to look in every one, just in case.

He checks Raylan’s trailer, first. It’s empty, of course. Shockingly clean compared to the rest of the trailers, with Raylan’s smartphone sitting on the bed. Its battery is dead, though, suggesting its owner wasn’t sitting here with it five minutes ago. Tim plugs it in, reads the last screen. It’s a text message to Loretta yesterday, soliciting weed.

“No sign of him?” Rachel asks, from the door.

Tim shakes his head, confused by the phone.

“No Loretta, either,” Rachel reports.

As if on cue, Tim’s phone rings. Loretta’s name pops up on the screen. He puts it on speaker phone.

“Where the hell are you?” Tim answers, unable to keep the anger out of his voice.

Surprisingly, Loretta rattles off an address in Harlan without hesitation.

“Do not move,” Tim says.

“Can you come get me?” she asks, and then cuts the line before he can respond.

“I’ll go get her,” Rachel volunteers, when Tim looks at her, baffled. “Stay here, text me if you find him.”

~

Raylan spent the night cuffed to Dewey’s bed, a 2 liter empty soda bottle provided for him to piss in.

Dewey snuggled up next to him, in superman boxers, but that was it. Whatever humiliation Boyd had imagined doesn’t happen. Raylan probably wouldn’t have bitten his dick off, but Dewey doesn’t take that chance.

There’s more yelling into a cellphone, in the morning. Raylan can’t deduce exactly what’s happening, because Dewey’s too fucking stupid to understand.

He does make Raylan toast for breakfast…which is nice.

“I flipped you,” he says. “For fifteen thousand and a pound of weed.”

“Flipped?” Raylan asks, suspiciously.

“I sold you for more than I spent,” Dewey explains, proudly. “Sorry, but I ain’t gay. I just wanted the girl.” He shakes his head. “I was only going to give Boyd half, but he took it all.” He looks frustrated. “I thought I was gonna get twenty thousand out of this.”

“That’s usually what he does,” Raylan agrees, still lost. “You want to uncuff me so I can take a shit?”

“You promise you won’t run off?”

“Sure,” Raylan lies. He doesn’t know who the hell is buying people in Harlan, nor does he particularly want to meet them. That’s providing anything Dewey is saying makes any kind of human sense.

An obnoxious electronic door bell echoes through the house.

“Oh hey,” Dewey says. “That’s the weed I ordered.”

“Wait,” Raylan tries, but Dewey abandons the handcuff he was about to unlock and bounds off towards the door.

He hears Dewey’s excited greeting, followed by a lighter voice. Raylan’s heart sinks; that has to be Ava. There’s more noise, then a heavy thud.

He yanks on the handcuff chain some more.

“Raylan,” a female voice calls. “Are you decent?”

That’s not Ava. The slight form of a teenage girl appears in the bedroom doorway.

“Hey,” Loretta says, smiling. “Sorry it took so long, Dewey didn’t do a single thing right.” She flips something from one hand to the other.

“Is that a stun gun?” Raylan asks.

She nods, looking pleased with herself.

“Come over here and unlock me so I can kill you,” he orders.

Smiling, Loretta approaches.

“I gave him ten thousand dollars to get you out of Harlan,” she says. “And he gave it all to Boyd? And didn’t leave Harlan at all. And then he tried to rip me off.”

“Key,” Raylan says. “Now.”

“Where is it?” she pats the bed.

“He has it,” he says. “Hurry, he’s going to wake up –”

And at that, an angry, red-faced Dewey appears in the doorway holding a handgun aimed at the bed.

Immediately, Loretta points the stun gun at him and fires.

Nothing happens.

“Those things only have one go,” Raylan tells her, belatedly.

Loretta shrinks back against him, raising her hands in surrender. She drops the useless weapon to the floor.

“Where the fuck is my pound of weed?” Dewey demands.

~

Dewey stays stupid. Unfortunately, he also stays armed. But he listens to Loretta’s woven tale about how she was just returning the double-cross and that his weed and his money are on their way. And he believes her.

“Just let me call my boss and explain,” she says, even though Raylan can feel the tension in her body. “You got us fair and square, you’ll get your money and the reefer.”

“Now I want ten thousand more,” Dewey says, loudly. “For zapping me!”

“We can work that out,” she agrees. Slowly, Loretta pulls out her cellphone from her pocket. “Can I make the call?” she asks.

Dewey nods. The gun is still aimed at them, but he’s also rubbing his chest where the electrodes hit.

“Hey,” Loretta says into the phone. “Can you hurry?”

“Ten thousand more for zapping me,” Dewey yells.

And that’s when someone kicks down the front door, shouting. “U.S. Marshals!”

Loretta drops her phone, puts her hands in the air. Raylan follows suit with his one free hand. For a second, Dewey looks over his shoulder.

“Drop the gun, Dewey,” Raylan orders. “Unless you want to get shot with a real gun.”

Dewey finally tosses his weapon at the ground, face defeated. “I was gonna get my money,” he says.

“No, you weren’t,” Loretta tells him.

“You can’t buy people,” Raylan takes the opportunity to inform him.

Dewey assumes the position on the ground, obviously familiar with this part.

Tim’s partner, Rachel, arrives in the room next. She’s flanked by other cops who secure Dewey’s gun and handcuff him.

“I called Tim,” Loretta says, with confusion.

“He was busy,” Rachel says. She makes eye contact with Raylan. “Looking for you.”

Raylan blinks at her, unsure of what she knows or how she feels.

“He has the key,” he says, jingling his handcuffs.

Rachel turns around to go find it.

“She doesn’t like you very much,” Loretta warns him, in a whisper.

“I don’t like _you_ very much,” he retorts.

“I saved you,” Loretta says, with a pout.

“Yeah, you did a great job.” He shakes his head. “A stun gun?”

Rachel returns and frees Raylan from Dewey’s shackles. But, and he anticipated this, she flips him on to his stomach and immediately substitutes her own cuffs, forcing his hands behind his back.

“Hey,” Loretta protests.

“Arrest her, too,” Raylan says into the bed sheet. “Human trafficking. Also, she sold that guy a big bag of weed.”

“I don’t have enough handcuffs,” Rachel says, hauling Raylan off the bed. She has hold of his collar with one hand and grabs Loretta’s upper arm with the other. “Move.”

He expects to get separated, but she puts both of them in the backseat of her car. Loretta climbs in first, unencumbered by handcuffs. He has to stoop and Rachel guides his head so he doesn’t hit it on the car roof.

“I’m taking you to Lexington,” Rachel says, softly as she does so. “And you’re going to sing every song you know about Boyd Crowder but don’t say one fucking word about Tim.”

Once he’s settled inside, Rachel points at Dewey in another car. “What am I arresting Superman Underpants for? Kidnapping?”

“Technically, I think that was her,” Raylan says, tilting his head at Loretta.

Rachel exhales. “Assault?”

“Also her.”

“Well, what did he do?”

“He thinks you can still buy people, he lost $10,000 and an imaginary bag of weed, and Loretta shot him with a stun gun,” Raylan answers, honestly.

“I hate Harlan,” Rachel says, and slams the car door.

~

In Lexington, Tim reunites with Loretta, first. She’s alone in the break room with hot cocoa, because everyone else bar Rachel thinks she’s an innocent, endangered minor. Tim knows better, but he still grabs her in a hug that resembles a sleeper hold.

“You are in so much trouble,” he says, into her hair. “What the hell did you think you were doing?”

Loretta immediately wiggles out of the embrace, until he’s left holding her shoulders at arm’s length.

“Saving Raylan,” she says, like he’s an idiot. “You weren’t doing anything for him.”

“Rachel says she got you out of the shack of a felon wearing superman underpants, and Raylan was cuffed to a bed. And you had a stun gun.”

“You were mad when I used a real gun,” she points out.

“That’s why you didn’t use a real gun?”

“No, I just couldn’t find one,” she admits.

Tim grabs the back of her head and crushes her in another hug that probably hurts a little, but he doesn’t care.

It gets out of his system, at least, because he’s not allowed to hug Raylan. Or kiss him. Or anything else.

Raylan has spent the entire time since Rachel brought him in, in an interview room, spilling 20 years of Crowder’s criminal past to the DEA, ATF, and FBI. He has a public defender in there, with him, but he hasn’t stopped talking.

Tim’s ashamed to admit he’s genuinely surprised when Rachel tells him that.

“Really?” he says.

“Yeah,” Rachel replies. She stares at him. “But it’s not all going to be admissible and his character is going to get destroyed by the defense attorneys, so maybe you have something to say, too.”

Problem is, they haven’t arrested Boyd Crowder. He and Ava weren’t at Audrey’s or with Bo Crowder or any place else covered by the sweep.

“I will,” Tim says. Just not yet. The moment he does, he stops being an officer of the law and goes back to a victim who doesn’t get told anything.

“Mr. Givens would like to use the restroom,” an FBI agent says from the door of the interview room.

“I’ll take him,” Tim says, immediately.

Raylan isn’t wearing cuffs. So Tim just has to walk with him, awkwardly trying to act normal. For his part, Raylan casts a glance up and down him, then looks away.

As soon as the door swings shut to the single-use restroom, though, Tim grabs Raylan and shoves him up against it.

Raylan grabs back, his chin tucked in to Tim’s neck.

“Are you okay?” Tim asks, voice muffled against Raylan’s cheek.

He feels Raylan nod. “Was gonna ask you the same?” he says.

Tim leans in, finds Raylan’s mouth, and kisses him. Not hard, not as deep as he wants. But neither of them can walk out of here with beard burn.

“I’m not sure how we got here,” Raylan says, when Tim finally, reluctantly pulls away.

“I’ll take credit, but I’m pretty sure it belongs to Loretta,” Tim tells him.

Raylan looks at him in confusion.

“I thought Boyd took her,” Tim says. “He had Johnny Crowder give her a message for me and then she was gone. DEA already had a raid planned, moved it up.”

“Message?”

“Video of various people I love strongly implying he could get a hold of any of them…or already had.” Tim grips Raylan’s arm, feels the muscle underneath.

Raylan blinks like he understands what Tim watched. “Oh,” he says. “Loretta see that?” he asks, face shifting unhappily.

Tim shakes his head. “She was on there, though.”

This makes Raylan frown some more.

“They pick Boyd up yet?” Raylan asks.

“Not yet.”

“Don’t let her go home.”

“No, she’s gonna be in protective custody. We all are.”

Raylan tilts his head. “All?”

~

Loretta gets twitchy around law enforcement and wants to leave pretty quickly.

“No,” Tim tells her. He hasn’t yet told her about protective custody or that Alison faxed over the foster care paperwork for him to sign.

“Why?” Loretta demands, peering around him like she’s looking for an exit.

Tim raises one hand and ticks off a reason with each finger, starting with his thumb.

“Running away. Stun gun. Whatever the hell you did in Harlan. I also heard mention of the words ‘giant bag of weed.’ No.”

“Am I under arrest?” she challenges him.

“You’re going to sit here with your cocoa and your little marshmallows and think about what you did,” Tim says.

Loretta slinks back into her seat, glaring at him.

“What did you think was going to happen?” he asks.

“You and Raylan were going to name your first child after me,” she says, slyly.

They’re alone in the break room, which is why he lets that fly.

~

~comments appreciated~

~the next installment will be the conclusion to this series~


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